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Neighbors driving you nuts blasting the latest Kathleen Turner Overdrive or Debussy? Fight back with the complete Pierrot Lunaire! Impress your friends by leaving a copy of the manuscript* printed on artificially aged paper out on your coffee table!** Defy your friends! Confound your enemies! Bestride your ancestors! And, best of all, tell Bach to shove his clavier up his well-tempered ass!†

* in German, obviously; babelfish
** coffee table not included
† more is inside!
posted by Eideteker at 7:10 PM - 32 comments

You just made $300 Million (well, you in the "We The People..." sense). The Air Transportation Stabilization Board (ATSB) was authorized by Congress shortly after the 9/11 attacks. It was critized by the Bush administration and some members of Congress as a risky bailout of major airlines, offering to guarantee up to $10B in loans. However, only $1.6B in loans were actually guaranteed under this program. And now, as their work wraps up, the American taxpayer stands to see an extra $300M in the coffers of the US Treasury.
posted by SirOmega at 5:37 PM - 20 comments

The Movie Binge. 85 major motion pictures will be released in the US this summer. These guys will watch them all.
posted by staggernation at 2:01 PM - 61 comments

Len Lye: New Zealander Len Lye was a restless maverick - a pioneer of films without cameras (drawing directly onto the celluloid) and kinetic art (CD available through Atoll, sound samples here and here), and he was also quite handy with poems and inks. More about his Windwand and recently installed Waterwhirler on Flickr. Coralised open directory of short Waterwhirler movies here.
posted by nylon at 11:47 AM - 7 comments

Since the 1930s, only 16 teams have held the World Cup Trophy. In 10 days, the 2006 World Cup will begin. Pick your team, pick your jersey, then find your time.

Once the teams have all gone home, more than just the balls will have changed. The world will be saying goodbye to one of the greatest players of our generation. And this time its for real.
Here is a little something to put you in the mood (youtube).
posted by RobertFrost at 10:42 AM - 148 comments

Why Tolerate Religion? Brian Leiter's new paper on the philosophical and legal justifications for toleration of religion. From the abstract: Religious toleration has long been the paradigm of the liberal ideal of toleration of group differences, as reflected in both the constitutions of the major Western democracies and in the theoretical literature explaining and justifying these practices. While the historical reasons for the special “pride of place” accorded religious toleration are familiar, what is surprising is that no one has been able to articulate a credible principled argument for tolerating religion qua religion: that is, an argument that would explain why, as a matter of moral or other principle, we ought to accord special legal and moral treatment to religious practices. There are, to be sure, principled arguments for why the state ought to tolerate a plethora of private choices, commitments, and practices of its citizenry, but none of these single out religion for anything like the special treatment it is accorded in, for example, American and Canadian constitutional law. So why tolerate religion? Not because of anything that has to do with it being religion as such - or so this paper argues.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 10:41 AM - 124 comments

Hikaru dorodango is a recent craze in Japanese school yards. Apparently it's an absorbing task, one that anyone can pick up. There are even competing, previously undisclosed techniques.
posted by ancientgower at 10:29 AM - 40 comments

No one's talking about "government lawyers and regulators engineer[ing] the future of the Internet," except, well, you, Mike. Craig Newmark debates with Mike McCurry over "net neutrality". Meanwhile, Hands Off the Internet seems to be a deceptively clever name for an organization sponsored by big telecoms.
posted by thisisdrew at 10:24 AM - 18 comments

This Week in God Salon interviews Karen Armstrong, a British ex-nun who has used her religious search to write several books on the subject. Her focus is not merely on Catholicism, but extends to many religions, including Islam.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 9:47 AM - 27 comments

Although paper sculptures have been discussed on the Blue before, you might also want to check out Calvin Nicholls (click on the gallery or portfolio links), who was profiled in the latest issue of Somerset Studio magazine. Here's another guy who creates people sculptures out of paper. There are many other artists out there who make sculptures from paper. Museums sometimes have exhibitions of their work. Check them out in person if you get a chance. Some of the sculptures are unbelievable.
posted by cass at 9:39 AM - 3 comments

Are Canadians changing parliament? It seems that the minority government Conservative Party has introduced legislation to set fixed four year election dates, the third week in October. Some people seem to think it can work, and others don't. Evidently I fit into a minority position as I can't see the benefit of having a year long election runnup.
posted by pezdacanuck at 9:18 AM - 40 comments

"The theories and opinions of the German philosopher Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno (1903-1969) on popular music and the culture industry are still highly influential in the domain of media studies. His thoughts about these subjects were very critical, pessimistic even. Adorno analysed the workings of the culture industry in terms of 'standardization' and used the concept of 'pseudo-individualization' to describe its effects on the listeners.
posted by j-urb at 8:49 AM - 14 comments

World War II Posters from the large collection at the Northwestern University Library.
posted by Gamblor at 8:34 AM - 18 comments

The dog's nuts of the periodic table.
posted by ozomatli at 8:22 AM - 41 comments

Vote Yes on Proposition 12? As in proposing a 12-year-old. Dutch pedophiles form a political party (English Wiki link)
Of course, they are not a one-idea party. They also favor "consensual sex between animals and humans".
posted by FeldBum at 7:59 AM - 43 comments

In Memoriam and in Protest --why not use an online deathmatch as a pedestal for speaking out against a war? Artist/Professor uses US Govt-developed America's Army (...placing Soldiering front and center within popular culture and showcasing the roles training, teamwork and technology play in the Army. ... ) as protest and art space. DeLappe's homepage (and jpgs) here
posted by amberglow at 7:11 AM - 130 comments

This will burn those summer calories. You need to watch this to the end. They are amazing!
posted by annieb at 7:01 AM - 101 comments

400 FREEWARES Direct links I just wish it was categorised.
posted by rinkjustice at 6:40 AM - 18 comments

Hungover this morning? Here's why.
posted by Mean Mr. Bucket at 6:21 AM - 13 comments

Megayacht ... ing
posted by magullo at 4:48 AM - 26 comments

For you: Amazing video of indoor precision musically choreographed aerobatic RC airplane flying. (From YouTube, of course.)
posted by loquacious at 1:47 AM - 50 comments

There's a myspace page for Q Lazzarus but you know she didn't create it herself. One of the biggest mysteries of modern Hollywood, how a singer could get a song on "Silence of the Lambs" but not appear on its soundtrack album, and a song on "Philadelphia" but not appear on its soundtrack album. And drop off the face of the earth. The mystery? In the age where one-hit wonders will to suffer any indignity to make a comeback attempt, Q Lazzarus disappeared. She's nowhere to be found. Maybe she's driving a taxi again.
posted by surplus at 12:41 AM - 26 comments

Bob Keller's Jazz Page "Welcome to my jazz page. It contains stuff to which I want to refer and to which I refer my students." Yes, it's just a single page of links, but wow what single page of links. An amazing jazz resource.
posted by jdroth at 8:08 PM - 24 comments

Dan Goodsell (of the unbelieveably great - and previously linked - Tick Tock Toys) has been keeping a blog for the last six months or so covering a variety of subjects (including his webcartoon, Mr Toast), but largely focused on U.S. pop culture ephemera of the 50's though the 70's, with a ton of great stuff.
posted by jonson at 6:45 PM - 5 comments

[nytimesfilter] Why is the New York Times obsessed with doom metal? For a newspaper that gives perfunctory (at best) coverage to non-classical, non-top-40 music, the publication of two articles about one marginal subgenre of indie rock seems incredibly conspiratorial.
posted by stemlot at 6:43 PM - 55 comments

Ice pictures. Not pictures of ice, rather pictures taken with a lens made out of ice. Alternatively you could use the bottom of a beer bottle
posted by Mitheral at 5:25 PM - 20 comments

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posted by dg at 3:18 PM - 67 comments

«The silent queen of all that is snowy and pure» (.pdf) I will never forget the first time I saw Giovanni Pastrone’s extraordinary Cabiria... I wasn’t quite prepared for the sheer scope and beauty of this film. And I was completely unprepared for having my sense of film history re-aligned. There are so many elements that we took for granted as American inventions – the long-form historical epic, the moving camera, diffused light. Suddenly, here they were in a picture made two years before Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. -- Martin Scorsese
It was the first film to be over three hours long, the first to use a moving camera, the first to cost 20 times the average cost of a motion picture; Pastrone took several elephants and hundreds of extras to the Alps, in the dead of winter, to film scenes that only lasted a couple of minutes onscreen. He hired an ex-dockworker and turned him into one of the first action movie heroes, Maciste. And, he also created the first international marketing campaign of the history of cinema. The Americans were so impressed that Cabiria became the first film to be ever shown on White House grounds. Last week, at the Cannes Film Festival, a beautiful, painstakingly restored version of this forgotten masterpiece has just been shown to the public.
posted by matteo at 1:40 PM - 13 comments

Robertson Says He Leg-Pressed 2,000 Pounds. I think I'll wait for the YouTube link before passing judgment, lest I be judged...NewsFilter, of course.
posted by pax digita at 11:11 AM - 84 comments

Howard French - Asia photos Photos from across Asia by Howard French, who works for the New York Times. Includes many photos of the 'Disappearing Shanghai' that is being obliterated by the city's relentless urbanization.
posted by carter at 10:29 AM - 6 comments

Econ 101. A collection of links to videos about economics for those who want to learn more about the dismal science.
posted by srboisvert at 9:47 AM - 9 comments

Brit comedian Rob Newman presents his 'History of Oil'.
posted by piscatorius at 9:27 AM - 62 comments

"History doesn't just repeat itself, apparently: It remixes like a DJ." The story of Tringo, once a pass-time in the online virtual world Second Life, and now a cartridge for Gameboy Advance. (Via)
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 8:50 AM - 17 comments

Fantastic photographs taken and developed on the island of Tinian during WW2, now scanned and restored. There are some bodies and nudity/nude art, so it's potentially NSFW.
posted by WinnipegDragon at 8:14 AM - 51 comments

Geek tracks down identity thieves via luck and persistence. What should you do?
posted by roue at 7:00 AM - 25 comments

Veteran actor Paul Gleason, who played Principal Richard "Dick" Vernon of The Breakfast Club and who acted in over 120 films television shows, died Saturday of lung cancer at age 67.
posted by QuestionableSwami at 6:03 AM - 46 comments

The Supreme Court ruled a week ago that police may enter a private home without a warrant to break up a fight. Does this have any bearing on the War On Terror? Some people think so.
posted by EarBucket at 3:56 AM - 49 comments

The UK has released the secret UFO files held by the Ministry of Defence under the Freedom of Information Act.

Their conclusion: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena exist but should no longer be monitored.

US UFO files here and Russian spottings discussed here

Time to break out the foil hats!
posted by dogsbody at 2:28 AM - 29 comments

He created Space Ghost, The Herculoids and made Saturdays worth getting up for with his Super Friends. In addition, he was a prolific comics artist. Comics great Alex Toth is dead at 77.
posted by DonnieSticks at 12:39 AM - 36 comments

Project Nekton — Take Mt. Everest, add a mile to the top, and turn it upside down. That's how far oceanic explorers Jacques Piccard and USN Lt. Donald Walsh descended on January 23, 1960 into the Pacific's Challenger Deep, the lowest spot in Earth's oceans. Their submersible, the second-generation bathyscape Trieste, was designed by Swiss balloonist Auguste Piccard (Jacques' father) and built in Italy. This underwater balloon was buoyed by 70 tons of gasoline, ballasted by nine tons of steel shot, and dangled a cramped, six-foot diameter, 14 ton observation gondola underneath it [more Trieste photos here]. It took Piccard and Walsh nearly five hours to touch bottom 35,800 feet down in the Mariana Trench. Their unique voyage still stands 46 years later: no one has gone back—except by ROV—and more people have landed on the Moon.
posted by cenoxo at 11:06 PM - 28 comments

June 6, 2006 (6/6/06) is the National Day of Slayer and the rules are simple: Listen to Slayer at full blast in your car. Listen to Slayer at full blast in your home. Listen to Slayer at full blast at your place of employment. Listen to Slayer at full blast in any public place you prefer. DO NOT use headphones! The objective of this day is for everyone within earshot to understand that it is the National Day of Slayer. National holidays in America aren't just about celebrating; they're about forcing it upon non-participants.
posted by mathowie at 8:42 PM - 94 comments

Union Boycotts Israel. Delegates to the Canadian Union of Public Employees Ontario convention voted overwhelmingly to support a boycott of Israel products, part of the The Wall Must Fall campaign. (TWMF Pamphlet in PDF form.)
posted by five fresh fish at 7:16 PM - 78 comments

Sternest Meanings: A fancy schmancy bot that takes what you say and returns a darn good anagram. "Shaky catacombs enchant fatty. Anyway thunderous star. Roman and ga-ga road." My conversations with bots always end up with me cussing and/or crying.
posted by bjork24 at 6:57 PM - 15 comments

What happens when you build your biceps up to 28 inches? Greg Valentino, the "most hated man in bodybuilding" could curl 300 pounds. Then his biceps popped (youtube). Another interview with the good Mr. Valentino.
posted by Rumple at 6:33 PM - 76 comments

A few years ago, this seemingly shy kid sat in his bedroom and recorded Pachelbel's Canon in D major. Recently, he recorded a different rendition. He's more confident and learning how to become a performer. Lest you think it's simply mimic, here's Beto (no offence dude...keep on practicing), a bit better by Indrek (notice no chords...is that Bill Gates?). Want a lesson? Here's one on a sweeping technique. JerryC's "official site" and "unofficial site". So who is JerryC? Someone to keep our eye on, eh?
posted by sluglicker at 5:18 PM - 104 comments

"CarLoft works like this: you drive the car into a modified industrial elevator, the CarLift. (Nearly all German luxury vehicles fit; only the massive Mercedes Maybach, priced at half a million euros, is too much car to lift.) A computer-controlled transponder recognizes the car and knows to which floor it should be delivered automatically." -- Metropolis Magazine has more. I don't drive but if I did and I lived in an apartment, I'd want a CarLoft -- being able to drive you car to your front door, five stories up. That's classy.
posted by feelinglistless at 4:21 PM - 29 comments

It is important to take the current political situation [NYT] in Iran in context. Shirin Ebadi and Azar Nafisi are two women who have written memoirs (Iran Awakening and Reading Lolita in Tehran, respectively) dealing with being a woman in the world's only theocracy. (bugmenot) Individual Iranians both commend and disagree with their portrayal of Iran to Western audiences.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 3:56 PM - 12 comments

Sous La Mer. Underwater nudes by Alberich Mathews. Webs of light. [via]
posted by nickyskye at 12:58 PM - 18 comments

This is not resolved! When a young man on a double decker bus in Hong Kong asked an older man to lower his voice whilst talking on the phone, the young man invariably became the receiving end of a torrent of half coherent phrase and insults about his mother. Naturally, you can watch it unfolding here since the entire event was captured by another passenger with his cell phone.

This video has become one of the most viewed clips on youtube, spawning remixes, rap, reenactments, new school yard sayings, and yes, t-shirts. And they say youtube is just a site for narcissistic kids and tv show clips. NSFW if you have co-workers who can understand Cantonese. And it's not the subtitle's fault, this guy really does rant off for a bit.
posted by phyrewerx at 12:18 PM - 95 comments

Irrepressible.info is a new campaign by Amnesty International and The Observer to fight internet censorship. One way to help is by publishing censored material from other websites onto your own.
posted by homunculus at 10:20 AM - 15 comments